I have so much to tell you and so little time.
So, let's not waste much of the latter and just jump right in.
Got friends who only talk about themselves?
When they do, how do you feel?
Most of the time, when I review cover letters, my feedback is something along the line: “OMG, this is too much about you.”
“But Marian,” I hear the reply, “shouldn’t a cover letter be about me and what I bring to the table?”
Yes, a cover letter is a sales letter and yes, it should be about you.
But, and this is a big but.
Make sure the letter is about your reader, and how you make her better off (while carefully weaving tidbits about you into it.)
Let that soak in for a minute.
"Count the number of yous in your copy. If you run out of fingers… you’re doing great.”
This sounds simple, but this single concept encompasses why marketing is both an art and a science. There’s no such thing as an objectively good or bad tactic. Your ability to stand out and beat the competition is not based on tools and tactics. Your advantage is in HOW you use those tools and tactics, WHEN you use them, and WHY you use them.
Without further ado, here’s a super-easy exercise you can try to see how much of your letter is self-centered.
Highlight in yellow all the phrases where you talk about yourself and what you want.
These are usually sentences that start with "I” or “my.”
Highlight in green all the places where you say "you”.
These are all the parts you talk about your reader.
Now, step back and take a look at your note.
Does it look like this?
Notice yellow versus green ration.
If you’re like most of my clients your reaction when you look at the sea of yellow highlights might be, “Shit, looks like I talk a lot about myself here. How can we fix it?”
In walks WIIFM.
What’s in it for me.
One of the fastest ways to make your cover letter shine with WIIFM is to employ the second-person in your content, which can be achieved by using the pronouns: You, Yours and Your.
When you use “your” or “you” to start a message, the receiver immediately feels as though it’s directed at them, personally.
Me? You’re talking to me? Yep.
At the most basic level, most people buy for one of two reasons — they buy to move closer to pleasure or to move further away from pain. Cole Schafer writes here: Let’s say you just found out you got a $10,000 promotion for being a stellar employee. You’re so happy you want to shout but you don’t want to scare any of your colleagues in the office. So, instead, you call your wife at lunch to tell her… and she screams for you. On the way home from work you stop by the liquor store to pick up a couple of bottles of wine to celebrate with your beloved. Instead of buying the $20 bottle of wine, which is probably the logical decision, you buy the $100 bottle because you think the higher price indicates that it tastes better… and why not? You just got a promotion. That night the two of you have a blast — grilling out, drinking, having sex and drinking some more. In the morning when you wake up, you have one hell of a headache after a night of one too many glasses of wine. You look to see if there is any Advil in the house. There’s not. So, you run to the closest gas station and willingly pay a significant up-charge on a very small bottle of Advil to make the pounding headache go away. In this short story, you paid for two very different things for two very different reasons. For one, you paid a bunch of money for wine, to bring you and your wife closer to pleasure. And, two, you paid for an overpriced bottle of Advil to bring you and your wife further away from pain. Nearly every purchase we make as people can fall into one (or in some rare cases both) of these two categories. $100 bottle of wine? Pleasure. $10 bottle of Advil? Pain. When pitching yourself, your product or service be very aware of why your customer is buying what you’re selling. Remember, people are much less interested in you than they are interested in themselves. The next time you write a cover letter and want to talk about yourself, just stop. Don’t go there. Don’t be that guy or gal. Tear up your 'elevator pitch' into little pieces. Avoid being self-centered (while boring your reader to death) Go for relevance. Go for pain. Or pleasure. Or both. Spice it up with emotions. Justify with logic. And get what you want.
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